Photographic print copying stations whereby a customer can scan a color or black and white picture and produce a copy of the picture are well known. An example of such a copying station is the Kodak IMAGE MAGIC Picture Maker, manufactured by the Eastman Kodak Company, Rochester, N.Y., which includes a flat bed scanner, a monitor having a touch screen input device, an image processing computer, and a color thermal printer.
In operation, a menu with instructions is displayed on the touch screen. The customer is instructed to indicate the size of the original picture and then to select a print layout. Print layouts can be for example one 8.times.10, two 5.times.7's, or a number of wallet size images arranged on an 8.times.10 sheet. After the initial selections are made, the customer is instructed to place the picture on the bed of the scanner and activate a button on the touch screen to begin scanning. The scanned image is then displayed on the touch screen and the customer can apply a set of editing tools, including zoom and crop. For zoom and crop, a red box is shown on the displayed image. The size, orientation and location of the box can be manipulated using buttons on the touch screen. When the customer is finished with editing the image, she is instructed to verify the result and to print the image by activating a button on the touch screen.
As with any such equipment that provides a service and uses consumable goods (i.e. printing materials), a good portion of the profit gained from the equipment is in the use of the equipment and sales of the consumable materials. Although photographic print copying stations of this type have proven to be very popular, their relatively high initial equipment cost limits the wide availability of the stations to the public, and hence limits the income derived from their use and consumption of the materials. One significant component of the high cost of such stations is the interface which allows the user to zoom and crop the image. It is desirable to provide a means for zoom and crop which is easy to understand and use while being much less expensive than present methods. There is a need therefore for a less costly version of such a photographic print copying station.